So I’m trying to write up some of the reviews I owe people (especially Eugie at The Fix whose been extraordinarily patient with me as I try – and abjectly fail – to put together a review of Strahan’s The Year’s Best SF and Fantasy that isn’t longer than the book – it’s coming soon I swear) – but, you know, when things are hard I end up being a bit rubbish and displacement activities kick in.

Which explains why I’ve been looking at my blog statistics (Ian Whates is still waiting on those film reviews I promised him a fortnight ago…)

More specifically I was looking at the countries of the top level domains of the people (and bots) who have visited the blog since January (and I want to review Quercus One: The West Pier Gazette here…)

So “hi!” to the usual suspects (you .com and .net robots – and few humans) – but “hi!” too to my plucky following from the Czech Republic and Israel (assuming, that is, that it isn’t the secret services in both nations still keeping an eye on me – let it go guys, it was a long time ago!). Bonjour to our French friends, hola! to the Spanish and ciao! to our Italian visitors (big fan of Florence, love what you guys have done to that place!).

A big shout out to Moldova, Poland and Switzerland. G’day and kia ora to our anitpodean friends in Australia and New Zealand (do Kiwis ever really say kia ora?). A hearty hello to our German, Dutch, Swedish, Austrian and Canadian contingents. And, to the happy few from Brazil, Japan, Latvia, South Africa, Norway, China (really?), Finland, Taiwan (that’ll put pay to the Chinese visits), Lithuania and Mexico, welcome.

Since the beginning of the year I’ve also had single hits from Bulgaria (I’m a big fan of Potev Plovdiv FC!), Andorra, Egypt, Greece, Croatia, India, Morocco, Malaysia, Russia and the Slovak Republic (it seems I’m much more popular in the Czech bit of the old Czechoslovakia, I wonder why?)

We even have occasional callers from Argentina, Thailand (love your food) and my favourite country in the world – Costa Rica (honestly, I know I’ve never been – but you should study the history of the place – the most liberal nation in Central America – a fantastic history of social reform, no standing military, the highest literacy rates in the region, traditionally a peacemaker, a beacon for decent government and some of the most astonishingly benign dictators in history. If I was going to get appointed as the benevolent dictator of anywhere, it would be Costa Rica – that’s a country that’s got things sussed. Buy me a beer sometime and mention Costa Rica to me, I can go on for hours, it’s hilarious!)

I’ve no idea what brought these travellers to my door, nor what they made of it when they got here, but come on in, sit a while, would you like a cup of tea? A biscuit? Ah go on. You will now. Go on.

Now excuse me while I pop off and write some reviews…